


Centre of Gravity

by Riona



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/M, Guilt, Post-Season 2
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-10
Updated: 2018-11-10
Packaged: 2019-08-21 15:17:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,406
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16579013
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Riona/pseuds/Riona
Summary: It's hard to build anything when there's this much guilt in the foundations. But they can try.





	Centre of Gravity

There have been no attacks for the last two months, no abductions. The Hundred are starting to recover from their ordeal at Mount Weather, Marcus hopes; they’re young, they’re resilient.

_The Hundred_. Fewer than fifty of them left. Maybe recovery is too much to hope for.

But the mood is less dark than it’s been in a long time. He’d forgotten what it felt like, living without death breathing down his neck in every waking moment. Failing oxygen supplies, explosions, a last-ditch plummet to Earth, conflict with the grounders, Mount Weather...

For now, at least, those aren’t things they need to worry about.

Which means his mind has started to stray to other questions. Questions he never really had a chance to consider before.

-

He invites Abby on a walk to the lake. She accepts straight away, which is reassuring. He enjoys her company, and he _thinks_ the feeling is mutual, but sometimes it’s hard to believe she doesn’t hate him after all he’s done.

They’re quiet for a while, looking out over the water.

“Is there a reason you brought me out here, Marcus?” Abby asks at last. It doesn’t sound like impatience; it’s... something else. Something harder to place.

Does she suspect? That makes things a little easier, he supposes; whether she’s interested or not, at least he might not be taking her completely by surprise.

He takes her wrist, gently.

“I’d like to kiss you,” he says.

He feels like a teenager. With all the life-or-death struggles they’ve had a part in, it seems ridiculous that the stakes feel so high now, in this moment.

“Oh, finally?” Abby asks, smiling. “You don’t have to ask. I don’t think I’ve been that subtle.”

Is he interpreting that correctly? It almost doesn’t seem possible. “I nearly executed you. I have to ask.”

Abby pauses.

“I actually _did_ have the man I love executed,” she says, pulling her hand out of his hold. “I’m in no position to hold that against you.”

Marcus winces. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have brought that back to you.”

“It never left,” she says.

They look at each other for a moment, Abby’s hand at the wedding ring hung around her neck. It feels like there’s something dividing them, like a partition of glass, like the door of the airlock.

“It’s not the right moment, is it?” Marcus asks.

“We don’t have time to wait for the right moment,” Abby says. “There’s peace today; what happens tomorrow? How many times have we almost died, just in the last few months?”

She touches his face. Marcus hesitates, then puts his hand around hers, holding it as she holds Jake’s ring.

“You’re sure?” he asks.

She kisses him.

She’s right, he realises. It’s always been the right moment. If he’d tried to wait until neither of them was thinking about Jake, or about the time he almost had her floated, he’d have been waiting forever.

(His mind still shies away in horror from the thought of the execution; what if he’d carried it out, what if Chancellor Jaha hadn’t saved them both from that terrible decision?)

The thoughts are still there, casting their shadows. But the kiss burns so bright in his mind that he can almost see the path through them, just for a moment.

-

They spend more time sleeping in the chancellor’s office, in shifts on the couch, than they do together in bed. There’s always work to be done. By this point, with so much passing of the pin and so much shouldering of the same duties together, it’s hard to remember which of them is chancellor.

(Not technically true. It’s Abby; he's always known it’s Abby. There’s something about her that’s always made him feel like she outranks him, whether it’s true or not. He used to resent it, back on the Ark. Now he’s just glad to know they’re all in good hands.)

Abby struggles with getting to sleep, whether they’re together or she’s sleeping alone. He’s become used to her asking questions from the couch while he works. ( _Your voice lulls me to sleep,_ she’d said once, and he’d laughed. _Should I be offended?_ )

“When did things change between us?” she asks now. “I’ve been trying to pin it down and I just... can’t.”

It’s a question he’s thought about himself.

“I think I’ve been in love with you for a while,” he says. “Maybe even back on the Ark. I hadn’t realised.”

“When did you realise?” Abby asks.

Marcus hesitates.

“When you were being shocklashed, I think,” he says.

Abby raises her eyebrows.

“When I was having you shocklashed,” Marcus corrects himself. He’d known she wasn’t going to let him get away with that. “I’m... I’m sorry.”

“That’s a hell of a time for that revelation,” Abby says.

Marcus half-laughs. “It really was.”

She’d held his eyes with such intensity, as long as she’d had the strength to keep her head up. He hadn’t wanted her to hate him. He’d realised how important that was, that she didn’t hate him.

“You were so fierce,” he says. “And just... very, very beautiful.”

“Unlike the rest of the time,” she says. He _thinks_ she’s amused.

“You’re always beautiful,” he says. “It was just especially clear in that moment.”

Abby sits up on the couch. “Are you asking whether you can shocklash me in bed, Marcus? Because the answer is ‘only if I can shocklash you first’.”

It’s a physical blow of a thought. He tries to hide it, but evidently not well enough. Abby starts to laugh.

One day he might ask whether she meant it. He’ll need to build up the courage first.

-

There’s an empty grave just outside camp, dedicated to the victims of sector seventeen. Marcus isn’t sure who set it up. But he visits sometimes, usually at night, when no one else is likely to be there. He doesn’t want to catch the eye of anyone grieving.

“Marcus?”

Marcus turns. It’s Abby; her expression is hard to make out with the lights of the camp behind her. “Abby. I didn’t know you came here.”

“Of course I come here,” she says.

There’s silence for a moment. It’s a little uncomfortable. As close as he and Abby have become, as painfully as he loves her, there’s always a tension in their silences. There’s too much history for them ever to be completely at ease.

“It’s been such a short time,” she says.

“I know what you mean.” So much has happened, so quickly. It’s hard to believe they didn’t have this in their heads a few months ago.

“Do I remind you of sector seventeen?” she asks.

He shakes his head. “I think being with you is the only time I’m not thinking about it.”

It’s a lie, of course. She can’t help him forget; nothing does. But she makes it easier; she’s a reminder that those lives aren’t a weight he has to bear alone.

A lot of them would probably have died in the descent. He’s told himself that, over and over. It doesn’t make any difference.

“I made them volunteer,” Abby says, quietly. “I killed the best of us.”

“I’m glad you did what you did,” he says. Maybe _glad_ isn’t the right word; it was terrible. But the alternative, killing unsuspecting people in their beds, would have been worse. “It was going to be a murder. You made it a sacrifice.”

“An unnecessary sacrifice,” she says. “Is that any better?”

“They died thinking they were saving the human race. It’s a good last thought to have, isn’t it?”

“Even if it isn’t true?” Abby asks. “I’m the reason they knew they were dying.”

Marcus hesitates.

“I think we have to believe it was better,” he says.

Selfishly, he’s glad that Abby had a part in it. He doesn’t know how he’d look her in the eye if they’d gone through with the original plan against her wishes, if they were standing here now with that knowledge, blood on his hands and none on hers.

-

There are days when he thinks the guilt is going to kill him. So many people have died to bring him to where he is now, so many people have suffered. He isn’t worth the cost.

When he’s with Abby, though, he can believe he might survive long enough for the wars or the radiation to kill him instead.

Maybe that’s what love means for him, now.


End file.
